The Consortium, founded in 1977 by
Xavier Douroux and Franck Gautherot (joined by
Eric Troncy in 1995), is one of the first contemporary art center in France. Focusing from the outset on
Minimalism and
Conceptualism – with exhibitions by Richard Serra, Sol Lewitt and
Dan Graham – this centre for contemporary art also followed up, in the 1980s, artists like
Christian Boltanski,
Hans Haacke,
Bertrand Lavier and others. The Consortium then went on to work closely with the new generation of the 90s: in addition to individual exhibitions by
Angela Bulloch,
Rirkrit Tiravanija and
Maurizio Cattelan, it facilitated such artists' projects on the nature of the exhibition as
Philippe Parreno's
Snow Dancing in 1995 and
Pierre Huyghe's
Mobil TV in 1997.
The Consortium also curated the
Pierre Huyghe french Pavilion at the 2001 Venice Biennale (winning "the Biennale Special Prize"), the
7th Lyon Biennal, and organised the
Flower Power exhibition in Lille, as part of that city's role as European Culture Capital 2004. The art center is also at the origin of the production company
Anna Sanders Films.
At the same time, Le Consortium leads a publishing program, essentially monographs.
Catalogues, monographs and artists' books by Le Consortium, presented below, are published under its name until 2006. They are now published by Les presses du réel (see the
contemporary art series).
